| Title: | The CHRISTIAN Notesfile |
| Notice: | Jesus reigns! - Intros: note 4; Praise: note 165 |
| Moderator: | ICTHUS::YUILLE ON |
| Created: | Tue Feb 16 1993 |
| Last Modified: | Fri May 02 1997 |
| Last Successful Update: | Fri Jun 06 1997 |
| Number of topics: | 962 |
| Total number of notes: | 42902 |
From: [HSLDA e-mail hotline] 24-AUG-1995 17:53:40.50 To: netcad::wiebe CC: Subj: South Africa Alert August 1995 **South African Home Schoolers at a Crossroads In South Africa, home schooling is virtually illegal. Only families who are 70 miles from the nearest school and have state-certified teaching qualifications are allowed to home school. Even then, a child must be sent to a registered school upon entering fourth grade. According to our latest report from South African home schoolers, three families have been ordered by the Education Department to stop home schooling their children, enroll them in registered schools, or be prosecuted. South Africa needs our help. **The U.S. Affected the Release of the Mientjies On December 14, 1993, Andre and Bokkie Mientjies were sentenced to prison for home schooling their children. Mr. Mientjies received a one-year prison sentence, and Mrs. Mientjies received a two-year prison sentence. Their children, who refused to attend the government schools, were put into a children?s home by the child welfare department. An Alert to Action was sent throughout the country and distributed at state conferences. Thanks to U.S. home schoolers who bombarded the South African Embassy in Washington, D.C. with protests, the Mientjies were both released from prison after a few months. In a recent letter to Chris Klicka, the South African home schoolers state, ?The help of the American people who contacted the South African Embassy for the Mientjies release was probably the most significant step in the achievement of this objective.? Your calls to the South African Embassy can make a difference. The Mientjies are out of prison as a direct result of the calls to the South African embassy. **New Government Will Not Recognize Home Schooling Despite assistance by Home School Legal Defense Association Senior Counsel Chris Klicka and South African Christian home school leaders in drafting a proposal to legalize home schooling and recognize the right of parents to control the education of their children, President Nelson Mandela?s government has issued its preliminary recommendations on education and training?and the proposal does not include legalizing home schooling. The ?white paper,? the first stage before drafting a bill, was released March 15, 1995 and proposed compulsory attendance for all children, compulsory birth registration, and the licensure of all teachers. The proposal even gave the government the power, if deemed necessary and in the best interest of the child, to remove the child from the home for educational reasons. These proposals came despite the fact Mandela?s government had initially indicated interest in protecting the right of parents to home school. The Home School Legal Defense Association continues to work with South African home schoolers to bring about the complete legalization and protection of the rights of parents to choose home education. Attorney Chris Klicka is writing authorities in the South African government urging them to fully recognize home schooling. **A Plea for Help Graham Shortridge, a key home school leaders in South Africa, states, "At the moment, the South African government is very conscious of American opinion, and this is our greatest hope for home schoolers. Mass action in the form of pressure on the South African Embassy in the United States is probably the only way we will get any cooperation from the Education Department since they ignore our submissions. We appeal to you to lobby on our behalf with the South African embassy urgently before our new constitution is completed." **A Call To Action The whole family should be involved in writing letters to the South African Embassy. This project can be a great educational opportunity for your children as they learn the importance of the freedoms we have in the United States and how easily they can be taken away. When writing to the embassy, include information on the success of home schooling. Your letter should include an explanation that home schooling is a protected right in all fifty states in America and that more than one million children are being successfully taught at home. Home school children are, on average, scoring twenty to thirty percentage points above public school children on standardized achievement tests. If South Africa is to be a truly free nation, its leaders need to recognize the right of parents to educate their children at home. No doubt many of you were involved in writing letters on behalf of the Mientjies as well as in campaigns to get Christians released from Communist prison camps around the world. Letters from Americans have a tremendous impact on nations seeking aid and support from America. Pass the word! Write to the South African Ambassador and request that his country both recognize the right of parents to educate their children at home apart from the state schools, and that the parliament would specifically enact legislation to guarantee the right to home school. Contact the South African Embassy at: Ambassador Franklin Sonn Embassy of the Republic of South African 3051 Massachusetts Avenue, N.W. Washington, D.C. 20008 (202) 232-4400 The impact we have on the South African Embassy will be reported directly to the national parliament. The influence will no doubt be felt in each of the nine provincial parliaments as well.
| T.R | Title | User | Personal Name | Date | Lines |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 783.1 | E-mail/fax pointers | NETCAD::WIEBE | Garth Wiebe | Thu Aug 31 1995 23:01 | 30 |
From: [HSLDA] "Jennie Ethell" 31-AUG-1995 18:25:48.14 To: netcad::wiebe CC: Subj: South African Embassy Info A member sent some information which will be useful in responding to the South Africa alert you just received. Besides contacting the embassy via mail or phone, you can also reach them via e-mail: [email protected]. Their fax number is 202-232-3402. Thank you all for your help in getting the word out -- and in going to bat for our fellow home schoolers in South Africa! Jennie Ethell HSLDA *************************************************************************************** Copyright 1995, Home School Legal Defense Association P.O. Box 159, Paeonian Springs, Virginia 22129 (540) 338-5600 *************************************************************************************** Distribute Alerts in their *entirety* only. Contact HSLDA by phone for further information on issues covered in Alerts. HSLDA members may subscribe to this E-Mail List for $5. Send name, street address, city, state, zip, membership number, complete Internet address, and check to HSLDA. *************************************************************************************** HSLDA is solely responsible for content of Alerts. *************************************************************************************** | |||||
| 783.2 | another update from HSLDA | NETCAD::WIEBE | Garth Wiebe | Tue Sep 19 1995 22:25 | 114 |
From: [HSLDA] "Jennie Ethell" 19-SEP-1995 17:47:33.37
To: netcad::wiebe
CC:
Subj: From HSLDA -- More on South Africa
We received the following message from Leendert von Oostrom in South
Africa. This is helpful information and better illustrates the situation
faced by home schoolers in South Africa. We urge you to contact the
South African Embassy at 3051 Massachusetts Avenue NW,
Washington, DC 20008. (202) 232-4400.
****************************************************************************************
The new National Education Bill for South Africa has just been passed
by both houses of Parliament, but has not been signed by President
Mandela yet.
It was tabled, debated and passed so fast that it is not yet available from
the government printer in the capital, Pretoria. This means that the public
had _no_ opportunity to see the Bill before it was adopted, let alone
comment on it. It also means that home schoolers do not know what it
entails for them - yet.
There was much resistance to the procedures followed - every one of
the six opposition parties, spanning the whole spectrum of right to left
walked out of parliament to protest what was happening - all they could
do, because the majority party is large enough to form a quorum on it's
own.
Home Schoolers fear that they have been treated in this Bill, as they
have been by previous governments. This fear in grounded in the
recommendations of the Hunter Report, which was tabled on August 31,
and on which the Bill (passed on September 14th) was supposed to be
based.
Despite extensive submissions on home schooling, citing the most recent
research available, including one prepared by an international pannel of
experts including i.a. Dr Brian Ray from the US, THIS is what the Hunter
Committee found and recommended on the matter of home schooling:
**********QUOTE************
Home Schools
5.35 There remains the question of "home schools". A number of
written submissions to the Committee asked for schooling at
home to be recognised as fulfilling the requirements of
compulsory education. Some also sought financial support for
such home-based teaching activities.
5.36 In the view of the importance of the social dimension of
schooling, the Committee reccommends that such
recognistion occur only when the provincial head of
education is satisfied that a child's distinctive medical or
personal sircumstances justify it, and the teacher is
professionally competent. The learners would of course enter
nationally recognised examinations at the designated stages
of schooling.
5.37 As regards state subsidy for such home schools, the
resources available to education in South Africa do not
permit their use in so uneconomical a way. Resources which
would be used to subsidise home schooling can obviously be
vastly more efficiently used where economies of scale can be
applied.
***********UNQUOTE*************
If you feel, as I do, that the Hunter Committee totally disregarded the
information on home schooling placed at it's disposal - if, indeed, it
considered it at all, and that the Parliament and the People of South
Africa have been served vary badly indeed in this respect, please
consider one or more of the following:
1. E-mail President Mandela ([email protected]) and inform him
that the Hunter report is gravely misleading on the issue of home
shooling. Urge him to delay signing the National Education Bill untill the
public, including home schoolers, have had the opportunity to get, study,
and comment on the Bill.
2. Mail a copy of the petition, or other comments on home schooling in
the Hunter Report to Director-General, Department of
Education, Attention: Mr U Boesenberg, Private Bag X895, Pretoria,
Republic of South Africa.
3. Fax letters to the editor to one or more of the following South African
News Papers, and inform the South African public of your opninion of
the section on Home Schooling in the Hunter Report:
(For *RSA* insert the country code for South Africa - it mostly ends in
....27)
Beeld RSA 12 215 232
Business Day RSA 11 497 2224
The Citizen RSA 12 327 5503
Noord-Transvaler Metro RSA 12 327 5105
Pretoria News RSA 12 328 7166
Rapport RSA 12 341 4620
Star (Daily) RSA 11 8366816
Star (Saturady) RSA 11 8347520
Sunday Times RSA 11 497 2664
(Note - while some of the papers are published in Afrikaans, letter in
other languages are generally accepted and translated before
publication)
4. There have been many instances where batches of submissions
and petitions have "dissappeared" without trace in government offices -
if you decide to act on our request, it would help if you e-mail me with
the information. This enables us to expose such cases.
Regards, Leendert
| |||||